The dragon was still there. The only difference was that this time, there were two dragons. The green-scaled dragon swooped into the brown-scaled dragon, scraping its back with its razor sharp talons.

"There's two of them now!" I shouted. "Why are they fighting?"

"I don't know. I don't think it matters, they can damage each other as much as they want, it will be easier for us to defeat them," Ivema said.

"Let's wait here until the battle is finished," I replied nervously.

"What if one of the dragons goes into Windhelm? Or both? We should be there in case it attacks, we could help."

"I barely killed a Dragur in there," I said with a frown on my face. "I'm certainly not ready to fight dragons."

"You have a point, but we should still go. It's going to be nighttime soon and it's dangerous out here."

"I'm sure it's less dangerous than being in a city that could potentially be destroyed by some dragons," I joked, I was somewhat serious, though.

At this point, the brown-scaled dragon began to lose control of its flight. It fell out of the sky and landed directly in the river outside the city. The green-scaled dragon flew downwards, also landed in the water. It let out a barrage of fire.

"Yol!" The dragon shouted, burning his opponent all the way down to a skeleton. The brown-scaled dragon had been defeated. After his demise, the green-scaled dragon flew back up to the sky, and left Skyrim. He began to fly east.

"Morrowind should stay alert," I said. "Do you have family over there?"

"No," Ivema replied. "My family has always lived here in Skyrim. They're all gone now though."

"Gone or dead?" I asked, realizing I shouldn't have said anything.

Ivema looked at the ground and closed her eyes. "Dead, I think."

"I've been through it, too." I put my hand on her shoulder. "Keep your head up."

"I'm sorry, I just don't like to talk about that stuff. Let's get to Windhelm now. We've been gone a while."

I nodded and we traveled up the stone covered road. The sun went down as we approached Windhelm's gates.

Upon our entrance into the Palace of Kings, Jarl Ogmuls gave us a welcoming smile. "You've retrieved it! I'm very proud of you two! This shield will be very well preserved. We will take better care of it than the previous owner." Ogmuls grabbed the shield from us and put it inside a display case near his throne. "Oh, and here's something for your troubles." He handed me fifty Septims.

I began to walk down the stairs that lead into the dungeon.

Ivema grabbed me. "Where are you going?"

"I'm gonna talk to Grush," I said. "He has information. I know it."

"Let me come with you," Ivema said.

"No. He won't say anything if you're there. You two don't exactly have a healthy relationship. He barely knows me. I'll get him to talk."

Ivema shrugged. "Fine. Tell me what he says."

I nodded and continued walking. Grush was still sitting in his cell, bruises and scars all over his face. He must have been hurting himself while he was trapped in there.

"Hey, Grush," I said.

"What the hell could you possibly want, Argonian?" He wiped sweat off of his forehead.

"You know exactly what I want. What were you talking about earlier?"

He gave me a puzzled look.

"Don't even think about playing this damn game with me, Grush. Tell me," I commanded.

"Fine, fine." He put a hand on his head. "Mehrunes Dagon is coming back, Tanen. He's going to destroy the world, just like he intended to during the Oblivion Crisis."

I bursted out laughing. "Mehrunes Dagon? How do you know? You've been drunk the past three weeks. I knew talking to you was useless."

"Whatever, you don't have to listen to me. But why do you think so many people are dying at the moment for no reason? Men, women, children, they're just randomly dying. No signs of anything that could harm them, but they die anyway."

"What are you talking about, Grush? I haven't seen any death other than the Nord you killed in this city."

Grush laughed at me. It was a very devilish laugh. He smiled and said, "It's happening right now. Right here in Windhelm. Go see for yourself. Dagon's right hand man is doing it. The plague of Tyite is upon us."

I received a sinking feeling in my stomach. I ran upstairs as fast as I could.

"You should've listened to me!" Grush screamed. "If Tamriel falls, it is your fault! Yours!"

I knew it wasn't true but I could not help but feel guilt flow through my veins.

Ivema approached me. "Well, what did he say?"

I shook my head. "No time to talk. I need you to check in on every family in the city right now."

"What? Why?"

"Just do it. You'll see why shortly, I'm sure."

"Tanen, what is going on?"

"Please, just do it." I opened the door that lead into the Palace of Kings and ran as fast as I could to the first house I saw.

I kicked the door open and saw a Wood Elf woman laying face down in the middle of her kitchen. I flipped her body over, swiped the long brown hair out of her face, and saw no signs of death. It was exactly how Grush had described it. There was no blood, no scars, no wounds on the Elf. I did not see anything that could have potentially killed the woman until I lifted up her shirt and looked at her back.

Imprinted on it was the symbol of Oblivion.

"Well I guess we had to leave behind at least some kind of evidence!" A voice exclaimed.

I turned around, and there he was, Tyite was sitting in a chair at the kitchen table.

"Surprised?" He asked with a grin. "Don't worry, we're not going to kill everyone. Yet. And we're certainly not going to kill you and your elf girlfriend! Absolutely not!"

"Why are you doing this?" I asked him as I clenched my teeth.

"Gotta follow the man's rules. Mehrunes Dagons' rules! Prepare for his return! He told me to kill some people in Windhelm, just as a warning to people, so that I did!"

"How does that work? The plague?"

"I can disappear whenever I want! Kill and escape! That's how I do it! It's not really a plague, I just call it that to creep people out! It's very amusing!"

"What about the dragons? What are they doing back in Skyrim?"

Tyite smiled at me and disappeared once again. I received no answer. As I put both hands on my head to process what was going on, the door swung open.

"Tanen! This is outrageous! All these corpses! What is going on?" Ivema was as shocked as I was.

"It's that damn Dremora, Tyite," I told her. "He was just here. He told me he did this. He says that he's working for Mehrunes Dagon. He's planning to re-enter Tamriel. It will be the Oblivion Crisis all over again!"

"Why the hell didn't you try and kill him?! What do we do?"

"Think about it, Ivema. He's our only source to Oblivion at the moment. We cannot kill him. What we can do is continue to question Grush. He knew about this before anything happened."

Ivema nodded. "Okay. I understand all of that, but what about the dragons?"

Chills ran down my spine. "I asked Tyite about them. He didn't reply. He gave me a devilish smile and then disappeared. Skyrim is in grave danger."

"So the plague is over, then? No more random deaths?"

"Yeah, that's what Tyite told me."

"That's at least some good news after this shitty day."

"This time I want you to come with me when I talk to Grush. We might get more information out of him that way."

Ivema cracked a grin. "You could've let me come down the first time."

I chuckled. "I know, I know."

When we got to Grush's cell, the door was left open. He got out.

He was gone.


Plot twist? Or did you expect it? Anyways, thanks for reading. Leave a review! You know the drill!